China is deploying naturalized athletes at the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics in a bid to prove its strong performance at the 2022 Beijing Games was no fluke.
At the Beijing Olympics four years ago, held on home soil, China claimed nine gold medals and 15 total medals to finish fourth in the overall standings—the country's best Winter Olympics performance ever. The result marked a complete redemption from the 2018 Pyeongchang Games, where China managed just one gold medal.
While home advantage played a significant role in China's breakthrough, the government's aggressive pre-Olympic campaign to naturalize foreign athletes proved equally crucial. Freestyle skier Gu Ailing (22, known as Eileen Gu in the United States) emerged as the face of that success, capturing two golds (big air, halfpipe) and one silver (slopestyle).
For the Milan-Cortina Games opening February 6 local time, China has again assembled a roster of naturalized competitors.
Leading the charge is short track speed skater Lin Xiaojun (29, formerly known as Lim Hyo-jun in South Korea). A former star of the Korean national team, Lin won gold in the men's 1,500 meters and bronze in the 500 meters at the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics. Following a one-year suspension from the Korea Skating Union in 2019 over misconduct, he became a Chinese citizen in 2020. Though he missed the Beijing Games, Lin returned to international competition during the 2022-2023 ISU Short Track World Cup season. At the 2025 Harbin Asian Winter Games, he claimed gold in the men's 500 meters, silver in the 1,500 meters, and bronze in the 5,000-meter relay. He is expected to face fierce competition from Korean skaters—widely considered the world's best in short track—at the upcoming Games.
Joining Lin on China's short track squad is Liu Shaoang, another high-profile naturalized athlete. Born to a Chinese father and Hungarian mother, Liu competed for Hungary as its top skater, winning four medals (two golds, two bronzes) across the Pyeongchang and Beijing Games. In 2022, he chose his father's homeland over his mother's and will compete under the Chinese flag in Milan.
Gu Ailing, the most celebrated naturalized athlete on China's roster, will also return to Olympic competition. Ranked fourth among female athletes worldwide in annual earnings ($23.1 million) according to Forbes in December 2025, Gu aims to sweep all three of her events—big air, halfpipe, and slopestyle—at this year's Games.